Carleton Putnam
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Carleton Putnam (December 19, 1901 – March 5, 1998) was an American businessman and writer who was an advocate for
racial segregation Racial segregation is the systematic separation of people into race (human classification), racial or other Ethnicity, ethnic groups in daily life. Racial segregation can amount to the international crime of apartheid and a crimes against hum ...
. He graduated from
Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial Colleges, fourth-oldest ins ...
in 1924 and received a
Bachelor of Laws Bachelor of Laws ( la, Legum Baccalaureus; LL.B.) is an undergraduate law degree in the United Kingdom and most common law jurisdictions. Bachelor of Laws is also the name of the law degree awarded by universities in the People's Republic of Chi ...
(LL.B.) from
Columbia Law School Columbia Law School (Columbia Law or CLS) is the law school of Columbia University, a private Ivy League university in New York City. Columbia Law is widely regarded as one of the most prestigious law schools in the world and has always ranked i ...
in 1932. He founded Chicago & Southern Airlines in 1933 which, in 1953, merged with
Delta Air Lines Delta Air Lines, Inc., typically referred to as Delta, is one of the major airlines of the United States and a legacy carrier. One of the List of airlines by foundation date, world's oldest airlines in operation, Delta is headquartered in Atla ...
. Putnam later served as
chief executive officer A chief executive officer (CEO), also known as a central executive officer (CEO), chief administrator officer (CAO) or just chief executive (CE), is one of a number of corporate executives charged with the management of an organization especially ...
of Delta Air Lines and held a seat on its board of directors until his death.


Life and career

Putnam was born to a prominent family from New England, his mother Louise Carleton Putnam, was the daughter of New York publishing magnate George W. Carleton. Paternally, he was a lineal descendant of
American Revolutionary War The American Revolutionary War (April 19, 1775 – September 3, 1783), also known as the Revolutionary War or American War of Independence, was a major war of the American Revolution. Widely considered as the war that secured the independence of t ...
general Israel Putnam. He was also related to the physical anthropologist
Carleton Coon Carleton Stevens Coon (June 23, 1904 – June 3, 1981) was an American anthropologist. A professor of anthropology at the University of Pennsylvania, lecturer and professor at Harvard University, he was president of the American Association of ...
, with whom he corresponded closely regarding theories of anatomical and biological differences between human races. * He was raised as part of the American Episcopal Church and remained a lifelong member. His best known book is entitled ''Race and Reason: A
Yankee The term ''Yankee'' and its contracted form ''Yank'' have several interrelated meanings, all referring to people from the United States. Its various senses depend on the context, and may refer to New Englanders, residents of the Northern United St ...
View'' (1961), an advocacy of racial segregation that originated in a letter he wrote to President
Dwight Eisenhower Dwight David "Ike" Eisenhower (born David Dwight Eisenhower; ; October 14, 1890 – March 28, 1969) was an American military officer and statesman who served as the 34th president of the United States from 1953 to 1961. During World War II, ...
protesting the end of segregation in U.S. public schools. According to Putnam, the immediate impetus for his letter to Eisenhower was the concurring opinion of
Justice Frankfurter Felix Frankfurter (November 15, 1882 – February 22, 1965) was an Austrian-American jurist who served as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1939 until 1962, during which period he was a noted advocate of judicia ...
in ''
Cooper v. Aaron ''Cooper v. Aaron'', 358 U.S. 1 (1958), was a landmark decision of the Supreme Court of the United States, which denied the school board of Little Rock, Arkansas, the right to delay racial desegregation for 30 months. On September 12, 1958, th ...
'', 358 U.S. 1 (1958), which Putnam refers to as "the recent Little Rock case". Elsewhere in the book Putnam critiques '' Brown v. Board of Education'', 347 U.S. 483 (1954), calling for its reversal. Psychologist Henry Garrett wrote the introduction. In this book, Putnam wrote:
In the next 500,000,000,000 years I would be quite prepared to concede the possibility the Negro may, through normal processes of mutation and natural selection within his own race, eventually overtake and even surpass the white race. ..When the Negro has bred out his limitations over hundreds, or thousands, of years, it will be time enough to consider absorbing him in any such massive doses as would be involved in the South today.
The mulatto who was bent on making the nation mulatto was the real danger. His alliance with the white equalitarian often combined men who had nothing in common save a belief that they had a grudge against society. They regarded every Southerner who sensed the genetic truth as a bigot .. Here were the men who needed to be reminded of the debt the Negro owed to white civilization.
After ''Race and Reason: A Yankee View'' was made required reading for high school students in
Louisiana Louisiana , group=pronunciation (French: ''La Louisiane'') is a state in the Deep South and South Central regions of the United States. It is the 20th-smallest by area and the 25th most populous of the 50 U.S. states. Louisiana is borde ...
, the American Association of Physical Anthropologists (AAPA) passed a resolution condemning it. Louisiana-born
Neo-Nazi Neo-Nazism comprises the post–World War II militant, social, and political movements that seek to revive and reinstate Nazism, Nazi ideology. Neo-Nazis employ their ideology to promote hatred and Supremacism#Racial, racial supremacy (ofte ...
,
Ku Klux Klan The Ku Klux Klan (), commonly shortened to the KKK or the Klan, is an American white supremacist, right-wing terrorist, and hate group whose primary targets are African Americans, Jews, Latinos, Asian Americans, Native Americans, and ...
leader and former politician David Duke has cited that reading ''Race and Reason'' in when he was a teenager in 1964 and taking in the assertions in the book led to what Duke called his "enlightenment", this book and what it purported convinced Duke that blacks were inferior to whites and that whites were superior to them in every way, leading to a racist worldview. Ultimately, it was Putnam's ''Race and Reason'' book that changed David Duke's life and led him to a lifetime of racism and by 1999, Duke was the most famous racist in the United States. Putnam also wrote a biographical book on
Theodore Roosevelt Theodore Roosevelt Jr. ( ; October 27, 1858 – January 6, 1919), often referred to as Teddy or by his initials, T. R., was an American politician, statesman, soldier, conservationist, naturalist, historian, and writer who served as the 26t ...
's youth that was praised by Edmund Morris, the author of the best known biography of that president. Putnam admired Roosevelt's belief that "Teutonic (and) English blood is the source of American greatness". Carleton Putnam died of
pneumonia Pneumonia is an inflammatory condition of the lung primarily affecting the small air sacs known as alveoli. Symptoms typically include some combination of productive or dry cough, chest pain, fever, and difficulty breathing. The severity ...
on March 5, 1998. He was survived by his wife, Esther Mackenzie Willcox Auchincloss, a daughter, three grandchildren, a stepdaughter, and three step-grandchildren. He was previously married to Lucy Chapman Putnam.


References


Works

* '' High Journey: A Decade in the Pilgrimage of an Air Line Pioneer'' (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1945.) * '' Theodore Roosevelt: A Biography. Volume One, The Formative Years, 1858-1886.'' (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1958.) *
Race and Reason: A Yankee View
' (Washington D.C.: Public Affairs Press, 1961.) * ''Framework for Love, A Study in Racial Realities: Address at the University of California at Davis with Subsequent Questions and Answers'' (Washington D.C.: National Putnam Letters Committee, 1964.) * '' Race and Reality: A Search for Solutions'' (Washington D.C.: Public Affairs Press, 1967.)


Further reading

*


External links


Princeton Alumni Weekly Memorials: Carleton Putnam '24''Race and Reason: A Yankee View''''Race and Reality: A Search for Solutions''Speech by Carleton Putnam, 26 October 1961
{{DEFAULTSORT:Putnam, Carleton 1901 births 1998 deaths 20th-century American biographers 20th-century American businesspeople 20th-century American male writers American airline chief executives American male non-fiction writers American political writers American segregationists American white supremacists Businesspeople from New York City Race and intelligence controversy Proponents of scientific racism Writers from New York City Deaths from pneumonia in Virginia Columbia Law School alumni 20th-century American Episcopalians